According to the India Post, India's astronauts may be known as gaganauts.

Robert PearlmanEditor

Posts: 31419From: Houston, TXRegistered: Nov 1999

posted 03-26-2008 09:13 AM
India is considering sending one of its citizens into space on board a Russian spacecraft to acquire the skills necessary for future manned space missions, RIA Novosti reports.

"India would like to have one of its astronauts trained in Russia and send him into space on board the Soyuz spacecraft," said a senior researcher from the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO).

He said ISRO had been in talks on the issue with the Russian Federal Space Agency and "received a positive response."

Robert PearlmanEditor

Posts: 31419From: Houston, TXRegistered: Nov 1999

posted 02-11-2009 08:52 AM
Space News via Space.com reports that the designs for India's first manned spaceship have been revealed.

In its maiden manned mission, ISRO's largely autonomous 3-ton capsule will orbit the Earth at 248 miles (400 km) in altitude for up to seven days with a two-person crew on board, ISRO chairman G. Madhavan Nair announced Jan. 3 at the Indian Science Congress held in Shillong. The capsule will be designed to carry three people, and a planned upgraded version will be equipped with a rendezvous and docking capability, he said.

...[ISRO spokesman] Satish said the astronaut capsule would launch atop a modified version of ISRO's Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV) Mark 2, currently under development. The GSLV Mark 2 features an indigenously developed cryogenic upper-stage engine; the Mark 1 variant currently in use has a Russian-supplied upper stage engine. The first test launch of the standard GSLV Mark 2 launcher is scheduled for this year.

Satish said ISRO's human spaceflight program will benefit from assistance provided by the Russian Federal Space Agency, Roskosmos. The cooperative arrangement was sealed in an accord signed Dec. 5 by Nair and Roskosmos Director-General Anatoly Perminov during a state visit to India by Russian President Dimitri Medvedev.

Under the accord, an Indian cosmonaut will fly aboard a Russian Soyuz spacecraft in 2013 ahead of ISRO's planned 2015 mission, Satish said.

TonyqMember

Posts: 158From: UKRegistered: Jul 2004

posted 02-12-2009 07:33 AM
I wonder when they will begin their astronaut selection process? It must be fairly soon if they are to:

Select an initial group of astronaut candidates

Provide initial training

Select two (?) candidates for the Soyuz flight to train in Russia from 2012

Soyuz flight in 2013

Looking at this rough schedule, they must surely have their pool of candidates beginning training by, say, early 2010?

In its first test flight no crew or any animals are likely to be flown.

"Only re-entry technologies and flight dynamics will be tested and the capsule will be recovered 400-500 kilometers away from Port Blair in the Bay of Bengal," Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) chairman K Radhakrishnan told NDTV.

domMember

Posts: 566From: Registered: Aug 2001

posted 02-15-2014 03:52 PM
Okay, so it's really going to happen. I thought it was all just wishful thinking on the part of the Indians...

The capsule is the same shape and size as the crew module ISRO plans to use to launch astronauts into orbit. Instrumented with sensors, the 8,000 pound (3,630 kilogram) capsule will six parachutes — two pilot, two drogue and two main parachutes — before splashing down in the Bay of Bengal some 1,000 miles (1,600 kilometers) southeast of where it launched.

The first experimental flight (GSLV Mk-III X/CARE) of India's next generation launch vehicle GSLV Mk-III was successfully conducted today (December 18, 2014) morning from Satish Dhawan Space Centre SHAR, Sriharikota. Also known as LVM3-X/CARE, this suborbital experimental mission was intended to test the vehicle performance during the critical atmospheric phase of its flight and thus carried a passive (non-functional) cryogenic upper stage.

The mission began with the launch of GSLV Mk-III at 9:30 am IST from the Second Launch Pad as scheduled and about five and a half minutes later, carried its payload - the 3775 kg Crew Module Atmospheric Re-entry Experiment (CARE) - to the intended height of 126 km. Following this, CARE separated from the upper stage of GSLV Mk-III and re-entered the atmosphere and safely landed over Bay of Bengal with the help of its parachutes about 20 minutes 43 seconds after lift-off.

Two massive S-200 solid strap-on boosters, each carrying 207 tons of solid propellants, ignited at vehicle lift-off and after functioning normally, separated 153.5 seconds later. L110 liquid stage ignited 120 seconds after lift-off, while S200s were still functioning, and carried forward for the next 204.6 seconds.

CARE separated from the passive C25 cryogenic upper stage of GSLV Mk-III 330.8 seconds after lift-off and began its guided descent for atmospheric re-entry.

After the successful re-entry phase, CARE module's parachutes opened, following which it gently landed over Andaman Sea about 1600 km from Sriharikota, there by successfully concluding the GSLV Mk-III X/CARE mission.

With today's successful GSLV Mk-III X / CARE mission, the vehicle has moved a step closer to its first developmental flight with the functional C25 cryogenic upper stage.

Lou ChinalMember

Posts: 1121From: Staten Island, NYRegistered: Jun 2007

posted 01-15-2015 03:49 PM
Is the hatch compatible with the ISS?

Robert PearlmanEditor

Posts: 31419From: Houston, TXRegistered: Nov 1999

posted 01-15-2015 04:01 PM
I don't believe so, nor do I think India has any designs on visiting the space station.

(And as it is, there really isn't an abundance of open ports on the space station by which to accommodate another vehicle. [NASA is having to reorganize the USOS so commercial crew vehicles having a place to park.])

Lou ChinalMember

Posts: 1121From: Staten Island, NYRegistered: Jun 2007

posted 01-19-2015 12:48 PM
I know I'm daydreaming far into the future but I can't help but thinking something like a docking module (similar to ASTP). I know space for docking ports is limited on ISS. This would be a tremendous incentive to a space fairing nation just starting.